Buried Hatred
by Virodeil
Summary: Politics is a dangerous grounds. Dwarven politics is even more dangerous, seeing that dwarves is an old race. It culminated in one time when the dwarves chose a new king after the untimely death of Hrothgar. Orik stepped up as a candidate... Dark Orik.


Thirteen dwarves sat around a round table in a room secured by thick stone walls. They were holding a meeting… arguing…

One of the dwarves, Lerak by the name, the Chieftain of Durgrimst Az Sweldn Rak Anhûin, stood in his rage and bellowed, "I can't have our clan be reduced into nothingness again! Az Sweldn Rak Anhûin refuses to go into human and elven wars anymore – whoever the chosen king might decide on the matter!" He slammed his fist onto the tough but smooth wood of the table, disturbing the peace of some tankards of dwarven beer which sat each before the thirteen dwarves.

"But perhaps we do not have to go to their wars anyway," another dwarf, Orik by the name, the new Chieftain of Durgrimst Ingeitum, said calmly. He did not falter even when Lerak was directing his venomous, bloodlust gaze towards him. He was even smiling in amusement.

"What's so funny?" Lerak barked at last. Orik chuckled but said nothing. Instead he addressed the whole room, signing Lerak to sit back down meanwhile with his hand.

"As I said, we don't have to go to neither human nor elven wars, but it is not because I fear for our safety in the first place."

"What is higher than the safety of our clans?" Lerak snapped. Orik yet dismissed him with a hand gesture.

"It is because neither humans nor elves have ever paid us well. Many of our warriors have died for them, and even our king has only died for the course, while they do nothing for us in return."

Orik's visage darkened with pent-up anger and sorrow.

"It is our nature as dwarves to think of fortune and rewards, yet we get none of the two from the other races, not even from those who assemble under the banner of the Varden."

The room was silent. Orik's incisive stare travelled to his fellow Chieftains, lingering on each the faces that looked at him expectantly. He was rather young in dwarven age, yes, and he was the youngest among the Clan Chieftains, but now it appeared as if he was the oldest.

"And our custom for such crime is usually revenge," Korain, the Chieftain of Durgrimst Nagra, murmured.

Orik glowered at him. "Usually?" he demanded, his tone a strained fury.

"Then you would turn on your Rider friend and his beast whereas you have been such a close friend to them? The Rider has even been a member of your clan!" Korain frowned. Orik snorted.

"Eragon might be such a good young boy when he was our guest in Tronjheim, but he changed when we arrived to the homeland of the elves," he explained when all the eyes in the room bored into him. "He forsook me for his crippled teacher and for wooing the elven ambassador who had not the slightest love for him. Was that a good behaviour for a brother?"

"Elves," Ûndin, the Chieftain of Durgrimst Az Ragni, repeated slowly, tasting each syllable of the word in his mouth with his tongue. His face a thoughtful display, he furrowed his brow in deep calculation.

"The elves have made fun of my warriors, haven't they?"

Orik sniffed. "Yes. Those four elven guards laughed at the twelve warriors you sent to escort us to Du Weldenvarden, I am sorry to say."

Ûndin crunched up his face ever so slowly while a red hue was creeping upon it, darkening his countenance. He only held back from bursting out his rage remembering that he was the oldest among all the Chieftains gathering there.

"They give us nothing but take everything from us. They do not care for us; they only care that we will help them in winning their war," Orik hissed, his youthful emotions winning over him.

"No!" Lerak roared, punching the table once again. "No more going into war as their subordinates! I say we stop assisting the war and retreat until either it is over or it is lost forever. Then perhaps we could have our revenge to the humans and elves…"

"I wish Eragon and Saphira had a better teacher who would open their eyes to little facts around him," Orik growled. For the first time his anger and hatred were tainted with disappointment and a slight sadness.

"Why should you think about the Rider and his beast?" Ûndin scowled at Orik. Out of the four dwarves who had had a say in the matter, he still looked second to the calmest… although until when it was still questionable…

"Because they were my friends," Orik said tersely, not looking at any of his peers.

"But they are not anymore, are they?" Lerak sneered.

Orik bit his lips. _Precisely_, he thought as his mind drifted back to yesterday's events. Eragon and Saphira had left to Ellesmëra to continue their studies, leaving the dwarves to march home with their dead King, alone and sorrowful, and the twosome would not even present when the new king was chosen, unlike the old customs of the Riders.

_The war is more than the worth of old friends for them. They will not mourn even if I die; or perhaps yes, for a time, but then they will be caught up in their lives and forget me_, he thought bitterly, unwanted hatred building inside him instead of pity for the two beings he had ever called friends and kindreds.

"We shall see, friends… We shall see…" he whispered. "Now let us begin the voting for the new king of our race and forsake the matters of the outside world for a while."

The silent room stirred. Murmurs, previously held back in the tense hush, ran along the table like wild fire.

Each of the dwarves picked up a small paper and wrote on it the name of the Chieftain each of them wished to be the successor of Hrothgar. This was their custom in choosing a new king: they would each vote for a name then collect the papers in a small basket to be later read aloud by an ignorant dwarf who had been chosen randomly from a nearby dwarven village or city for his or her neutrality; the Chieftain who was voted the most would of course become the new king…

And this time it was Orik.

The reader of the papers, a young female dwarf who did not even know where she was, had just left the room when Orik stood up, mastering all his wills.

"This is an honour," he began with a thick voice, reminded of his uncle Hrothgar who had been so kind to him, who had been wrenched from him by the war started by humans and elves…

Even Lerak held his tongue, knowing so well the meaning of the moment for the young dwarf, the successor of Hrothgar for the position of Chieftain and now their king…

"We will fight-"

Murmurs of surprise and protest rann along the room.

"-But it is not for humans or elves. It is for us and only us, and after the acurst Galbatorix has been put to death we will have our revenge on the humans and elves…"

Wolfish smiles broke on the Chieftains' faces hearing it, and they agreed at once.

_Good bye, Eragon, Saphira_, Orik mused, a hard note layering his thoughts. _Good bye. It is a great mistake to forsake the friendship offered by a dwarf, and even a dwarf in my position. You will pay for that careless ignorance. Not shall again we be friends._

He marched out of the room, followed closely by the other Clan Chieftains. Lerak was directly behind him. The oath of war clan between Durgrimst Ingeitum and Az Sweldn Rak Anhûin had automatically been invalid after Orik, the clan chieftain of Durgrimst Ingeitum, had sworn vengeance to the only human member of his clan, the member who had triggered the clan war in the first place.

The chieftains stood in a semi-cyrcle right outside the room. They had planned to inform the dwarven society right there and then, spreading from Tarnag to Tronjheim to Buragh and other dwarven inhabitants, but before they could arrange anything in advance a messenger came to them, curiosity and worry in his face.

"Two men from the Varden have just arrived. They demanded a meeting with the new King and wish to deliver themselves the missive from the leader of the Varden," the messenger spoke, bowing to the noble dwarves.

Twelve heads turned to Orik in reflex. Thus the messenger got a hint and became the first civil inhabitant of the dwarven community to know…

"May I assume that the new King is from Durgrimst Ingeitum?" he murmured, bowing deeply to Orik.

Orik smiled warmly to the messenger, but his eyes were cold when he spoke, and even his tone was flat and emotionless. "Let them come to me. Afterwards we may decide what will become of them."

The messenger bowed and scurried away, looking half proud half dreadful. He came back some minutes later with two male humans tailing behind; the two humans were soldiers, apparently, garbed in heavy armour which almost covered their entire bodies. They bowed to Orik, seeming apprehensive.

"Lady Nasuada pleads for assistance from dwarven community," the first man declared. "Our liege wishes for the new King's kindness to spare us the Varden some soldiers to aid us in the coming attack to Kuasta…"

"The demand shall be considered," Orik announced. Lerak opened his mouth to reproach Orik but Ûndin stopped him with a stern gaze.

"Now you may go, but please leave your friend here and also please carry for me a request for Eragon Shadeslayer to take off his Ingeitum helmet and never wear it again."

The spokesman gazed at Orik warily. "Why do you wish my friend to stay here, … King Orik?" he asked, sounding reluctant to call Orik King.

"Then you may stay here and your friend is the one to go to Nasuada and Eragon for me," Orik replied smoothly, the spokesman appeared more frightful than cautious now.

"I need to ask him to deliver a message to my family," the spokesman excused himself when the other man who had come with him had been gone for half an hour. He was panick, but it was only because he had forgotten to ask for permission from his liege to stay for long in Tarnag…

The man never knew what happened. He turned away hurriedly, running as fast as he could tracing the path taken by his fellow messenger a while back… There was a twang of string, a silent whisper of something fast moving along the air, and he was dead before even touching the ground; a bloody hole was formed on his neck, on the only weakness in his thick iron necklace.

Orik laughed aloud, gleeful and malicious. "Thank you, Lerak, for lending me the bow and arrow," he chortled to the Clan Chieftain of Durgrimst Az Sweldn Rak Anhûin. "Now my short-term goal has been fulfilled… That is the price for not believing that I am a King."

He stepped forward confidently and kicked the dead spokesman's ribs with a booted foot. Blood spurted from the corpse's ajar mouth. Orik spat on the hole he had made on the messanger's neck then made his way to Selbedeil, laughing all the while, celebrating his first victory… a little gratification for his revenge…


End file.
